This is a privileged stemlord who's convinced they're the smartest person they've ever met. It's hard to understand, I know, but they'll never get it

You disagree because you have no idea what you're talking about. Dumb people don't know how dumb they are (let me spell it out for you: you're dumb)

Actually, "None of these things are anything I know anything about, therefore it must be simple and stupid" is what you meant to say. I know words are hard; you're simple and stupid.

Disagree. In some fields you need many years of theoretical fundation to even begin to understand the bases of what you are supposed to do.

A mechanical engineer will not be able to understand their job without being able to solve partial differential equations, and that is something you learn more efficiently from a calculus lecture at university, not on the job with a master of the trade.

My point is that in my opinion library science is not well suited for academic education and should rather be tought like a trade with a licensed trade school and apprentiship, or learned on the job after getting a literature degree.

In my opinion there are not enough abstract knowledge in how to manage a library and the subject is a manifestation of a proliferation of subjects used by universisties to advertise rather than something useful for society or students.

I am of this opinion likely because of my bias as a stem graduate that makes me naturally arrogant. I am trying to assess if I can find someone to change my opinion.

I failed for now.

Science of information are about how knowledge, information and data is structured and stored. It is quite close to informatics but informatics has a greater focus on computing science which are the leading technology for doing just that today. Yet, they are many technology that was and are still in use to deal with information, wether it is about historic information saved in a pre-computer area or today in many places and for many reason.

It is a very deep subject, very academical and many way to practice it the most visible way to practice it is thought a computer but museum, archive, library, fond, place were electricity is not available for security or fourniture reasons are also looking for that kind of worker.

So... plumbers require education, too. In the US it's apprenticeship, trade school, or community college to get licensed. In the UK it's similar, so not just a US thing. You do one of these routes to prove you can do the skilled labor, and receive a license for doing so.

There is not a "trade school" for a librarian, because to prove you can be a librarian, you need to prove you can learn consistently and over a long period of time. That's not possible without longer education.

Your argument makes it sound like plumbers don't require education (not your intent, I know), but denigrating the librarian trade doesn't help, either.

Library science is more about curating and organizing information than running a library. Most people with MLS degrees don't work in a library.

Besides the obvious books, movies, and video games, my public library less than 2 miles from my house also has a maker space staffed by the library including 3D printers, dye sublimation printers, 4' wide format vinyl printer, 4' wide paper/adhesive backed paper printer, flatbed scanners, and even T-shirt and ceramic mug thermal image transfer machines.

Libraries are awesome!

I'm trying real hard but am having a real tough time figuring out what point you're trying to get at.

Should we trust people in trades who have been doing it 20 years? I mean yeah, probably? And...?

https://www.asme.org/learning-development/learning-experiences/piping-and-pipeline-engineering-program

https://www.findamasters.com/masters-degrees/?Keywords=pipeline+engineering

https://www.educations.com/institutions/the-international-institute-of-plant-engineering-and-design/master-in-piping-engineering-and-design

So it has a different name than "masters of plumbing". So what? Literally what is your point?

I think what a ton of people are missing is that librarians also study and teach HOW to research and gather information. Quite literally something that is best served by someone well versed in that through a masters. Source: one of my university mates is a university librarian.

You could say that about any job

All these do not sound like stuff you learn in an university but stuff you learn from a master of the trade?

There’s lots of BBL content out there

Awesome, agreed. Not to forget, themeaning of library has expanded since my time at school. It should include data and data formats and objects which didn't exist in the 60's. I love knowledge and librarians to systematise it and store it, and let me use it.

That's a very niche pornhub category

There's a reason for that but you wouldn't like it

its also rare to see them in stem as professors too, like physicists.

LibrariMan

The core skill missing from literature and history is curration, how do you grow, prune and organize a collection of books to meet the needs of the community.

Then you've got maintenance, repair and handling of the books themselves which is super important if you're working with rare items.

Finally, most librarians are basically running a community centre filled with children, and you have all the skills and safeguarding concerns that go along with that.

Not what I was going for but I can see how it can be read that way. My point was that librarian is a job that requires a lot of academic training because it’s a job that heavily relies being able to navigate academic work, which really isn’t the case for plumbing or other trade jobs. That doesn’t make the work mindless, you obviously have to engage your mind to engage in any skilled work. It’s just a different kind of mental engagement, I don’t think anyone who has worked a ‘traditional’ academic job and a trade job would contest that.

A plumber does not just cut and paste pipes or unclogs sinks either. You are denigrating trades in your first phrase by equating them to simple mindless menial jobs my dude

No idea tbh, that is why I asked in the first place. For now nobody has answered something that convinced me 2 years of academic degree are necessary to learn what is essentialy a building manager with strong foundations in literature and or history.

Please note, I am not saying they should not have a degree in history or literature, just that library science seems hyperspecific to check off some box on a university advertisement.

Local library fan from Illinois here, and I say hell yeah!